DESTRUCTION OF WILD BIRDS' EGGS 131 
the birds had evidently planned to nest on every bit of rising 
ground from which swift out-look over the gull-nursery could be 
obtained. 
Who shall describe the uproar and anger with which one 
was greeted as one stood in the midst of the nests ? The black- 
headed gull swept at one with open beak, and one found oneself 
involuntarily shading one’s face and protecting one’s eyes as the 
savage little sooty heads swooped round one’s head. But we 
were not the only foes they had had to battle with. The carrion 
crow had evidently been an intruder and a thief; and many an 
egg which was beginning to be hard set on had been prey to the 
black robber’s beak. One was being robbed as I stood there in 
the midst of the hubbub. 
Away, for what seemed the best part of a mile, the 
“ gullery ” stretched to the north in the direction of Seascale; 
and one felt that, thanks to the public-spirited owner of the sea- 
board, and the County Council of Cumberland, the black-headed 
gull was not likely to diminish in this generation. 
Back to the boat we went with a feeling that we owed large 
apologies to the whole sea-gull race for giving this colony such 
alarm, and causing such apparent disquietude of heart, and 
large thanks to the lord of Muncaster for his ceaseless care 
of the wild sea-people whom each year he entertains upon his 
golden dunes. 
THE DESTRUCTION OF WILD BIRDS’ EGGS. 
HE Act prohibiting the taking of eggs at this season, as 
far as this district is concerned, seems to be practically 
a dead letter. In my daily walks I have only once 
seen one of the bills setting forth the penalties for 
taking eggs, and that was not in the most conspicuous position. 
Only last Sunday evening I found a boy with his cap full of 
thrushes’ and blackbirds’ eggs, and holding in his hand four 
nightingales’ eggs — these latter far advanced in incubation. He 
had never heard of the pains and penalties involved in taking 
these, and it was impossible to impress on the youthful mind 
(aged 12) the wanton destructiveness of his actions. 
To be really at all effective one of the bills should be posted 
at the principal entrances of every wood and plantation, and 
attached to (not pasted round) every signpost in the county in 
a permanent fashion akin to a County Council notice board. 
The village school, National, Church or Board, should have 
framed bills hung up both inside and outside the building, for 
the instruction of the scholars. Prevention is better than 
prosecution : besides the village constables think it rather 
beneath them (as indeed it is) to arrest or summon an urchin 
